GENERAL OBSERVATIONS AND SUMMARY. 135 



mixed with alcohol it had no disinfecting influence at 

 all. Bisulphide of carbon had no effect upon them until 

 a temperature of 176^ was reached, which, of course, is 

 far beyond any practical temperature for the body. 

 Bacteria that are free from spores may be destroyed at 

 212°, the boiling point of water, but spore-bearing mi- 

 crobes will resist 280°. Excepting the germ of yellow 

 fever, their bodies are proof against cold as well as 

 against heat. The microbe of typhus withstands a con- 

 siderable degree of cold, thus indicating a typical differ- 

 ence between that and yellow fever. 



I have succeeded in propagating microbes in different 

 fluids in which some of these medicines, as carbolic and 

 muriatic acids, were mixed. Hydrochloric acid is in- 

 deed present in the stomach during digestion, where, 

 being in small quantities, it certainly does not destroy 

 fermentation. I have added to my bottles of microbe 

 culture as much as twenty-five percent of mercury, and 

 even with that degree of strength it required from three 

 to ten hours to kill them. All this line of experiment- 

 ing convinced me that I have to use large doses of med- 

 icine, and to carry it through all the tissues, if I would 

 destroy the microbes of disease ; but with the medicines 

 that the doctors prescribe this cannot be done, and, with 

 the small doses they are forced to give, nothing but a 

 very imperfect result is possible. I often found the con- 

 tents of bottles which I carried about with me to be 

 dried up. Nothing remained but a dry, dusty substance, 

 which would break up like the ashes of a cigar. When 

 I added a little distilled water to this, and allowed it to 

 stand for a few days, the microbes would be alive again, 

 multiplying as rapidly as before, because the germs re- 

 main dormant in a dry state, just like seeds, but they 

 will grow when kept moist. Every housekeeper knows 

 that yeast cakes may be kept dry for months, and that as 

 soon as they are moistened and placed under favorable 

 circumstances, with a sufficient temperature, they in- 

 duce fermentation. This is nothing more than the yeast 

 plant, which is a fungus or microbe, revivifying and in- 



